


The Wanting and the Having

by waldorph



Series: Illogical (√π233/hy7) [12]
Category: Star Trek (2009)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon, Angst, F/M, Minor Character Death, Romance
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2009-10-20
Updated: 2009-10-20
Packaged: 2017-10-02 22:37:03
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 7,962
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/11433
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/waldorph/pseuds/waldorph
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>T'Pring is being bonded to Spock because of its political and, indeed, monetary advantage.</p>
            </blockquote>





	The Wanting and the Having

**Author's Note:**

  * Translation into 中文 available: [The Wanting and the Having 所欲与所得](https://archiveofourown.org/works/987228) by [racifer](https://archiveofourown.org/users/racifer/pseuds/racifer)



**01.**  
He is, she is told, half-Vulcan, and half-Human. His mother is a Human woman, whom T'Pring believes she can remember from clan gatherings (though it is possible it is a false memory, and that she is only transposing pictures of the woman into the sea of faces at those events). Looking down at the images now she thinks Amanda Grayson looks a kind woman, and not deserving of the mistrust and scorn T'Pring knows she receives (it ebbs like ink through her name whenever anyone speaks of her).

Ambassador Sarek is one of the most respected and prominent Vulcans in their clan, and indeed on Vulcan. As the Ambassador to Earth, he is consulted in all manner of things, and his opinions weigh heavy. He is also a member of the Vulcan Science Academy's Board of Admissions. Regardless of these facts, T'Pring can sense from her parents and from those around that there is something incorrect with his marriage to Amanda Grayson; that while T'Pring is being bonded to Spock because of its political and, indeed, monetary advantage, Spock himself is somehow… undesirable. In their minds, his name is the brown of Earth's dirt.

She cannot acquire fully-formed answers. Questions result in uncharacteristic hedging and minds slamming shut around her, and she realizes, as she is brought to the bonding ceremony, that she will have to discover what is so terrible about Spock herself. Very well. She lifts her chin under the enormous hairstyle and straightens her shoulders under the multiple layers of fabric that make up her elaborate gown.

He looks, at the ceremony, no different than any other Vulcan boy she has met. The dark, folding robes render him small, but her own hair is piled atop her head like a small mountain, and she can sense in him, even before the bond takes hold, the quiet resignation of one who has been dressed by one's parents.

It makes her like him before the ceremony is even complete.

They are left together in a solarium, likely closely monitered by their parents outside, to acclimate to the bond; to the presence of another mind closely linked with their own.

His mind feels like a tidal wave, and she does not think it is his lack of control; it is simply that his melding abilities and the strength of his mind therein are far greater than her own.

He takes, and she gives, gleaning little of him as they sit side by side, backs to the window. She does not know how long they sit like that, but at some point the onslaught slows to a cool ebb, like waves lapping against a shore.

"I think your father was perfectly correct in marrying your mother," she tells him as the sun sets and everything turns brilliant red. She is surprised to find that she is enjoying it, and then realizes that she is not—that Spock is the one of them who loves this time of day, and by proxy so does she, now.

He blinks at her, and he seems inclined to have her explain it, rather than to search her mind for the provocation. Which is just as well, as she is unsure of the provocation herself.

"Humans are Vulcan allies. Obviously we should have close relations: Ambassador Sarek was perfectly correct in marrying and fathering a child with a Human. Very logical," she adds, nodding to herself. Then she reaches up and pulls her hair out of its twisting growth atop her head, because it hurts, and she feels as though she is wearing abstract art on her head.

He looks at her, and then lifts an eyebrow, reaching up and helping her so that it does not tangle.

"Show me how to do that," she demands, reaching out and tracing the line of his eyebrow. _Fascinating_.

He tries. He pushes her eyebrow up with his finger, has her raise both and then pushes the other down, but it never works. She frowns and contorts her face in concentration, and soon he is collapsed in laughter, and she thinks to be annoyed, but then his mind flashes to her how she looks, and they both dissolve into fresh laughter.

She likes him, but she must teach him not to laugh so freely; happiness is not a dangerous emotion, but allowing one emotion to take over is to allow all to take over, and their people have come too far to be so unravelled.

It is difficult to navigate the bond; foods she used to like hold no appeal to her, and people whom she had once been fond of she now holds strange resentment towards.

The bond colors everything, and she is unsure of whether Spock feels the affects as strongly. When he picks up a cracker with cheese she realizes it does not: she dislikes Guuran cheese.

For a week she builds slow walls against it, tampered by her own reluctance. It feels like a secret between them, but her mother sits her down three days into slow pogress and says,

"T'Pring. I know that the bond makes you desire further closeness, but do not confuse loss of self with being close. You are T'Pring, he is Spock, and the two are joined, but not the same." Her fingers press a kiss to T'Pring's and she draws back, standing tall and outlined in the high Vulcan sunlight. She is calm and logical and strong, and T'Pring would someday be so. "I believe we will work on your mental defenses," Mother adds. "You seem weaker than he."

The words are shaded a sickly green and spiderwebbed angrily with black: her mother is disgusted that the half-Human, half-Vulcan Spock should be a better telepath than her full-Vulcan daughter.

T'Pring thinks to be resentful, but even though her mother wishes it were not so, Spock is there in the back of her mind, and T'Pring knows him.

Biology or no, Spock is _her_ people. Her person.

**02.**  
"I shall flay them," she decides. They are nine, and she has just been informed of their fight; it would explain why she suddenly broke her stylus and saw red and black so strongly it overpowered her optic input for 2.5 seconds. "Given adequate vacuuming the Vulcan body can be drained of blood in 3.2 seconds."

He lifts an eyebrow at her, just because he can. She is onto him. "I do not need you to fight my battles for me."

"do not be absurd," she dismisses, sitting beside him and removing the cheese from her plate and taking from him the bread. "You are physiologically smaller than they— you were fortunate to catch them off-guard with your rage."

"I am stronger than they are," he maintains, splitting his lip again.

"You took advantage of their cowardice and attachment to non-action by countering with a vehement course of violent action." She raises her eyebrows at him. "You are bleeding."

"It is nothing."

"It is not logical to suffer so, unless of course this is part of the punishment, and the enduring of the physical wound is designed to act as a reminder not to participate in the course of action which garnered it in the first place."

He looks at her, and the looks is familiar already. "T'Pring."

"Yes?"

"You talk too much."

It is a thank you, and she allows her shoulder to press against him briefly in an unspoken, "You are welcome." She takes her handkerchief and dabs green smears onto it, putting pressure on his lip.

He does not rise to the bait, but after The Incident no one baits him. They are frightened of him, if still resentful.

He stops laughing, and she is glad of it, but misses the clear ringing sound of it. Which is illogical, as it is clearly in his best interests for the laughter to be subdued to an amused shift of his eyebrow; a glint in his eyes which, she must admit, are very Human.

They are so dissimilar. She has a complacency in the conviction that she will never be turned away for what she is; he has never known that easy acceptance. She enjoys the company of many; he is solitary, and prefers his mother to any peer. She is content on Vulcan; she can feel in him a desire to fly and touch his fingertips to the stars yet undiscovered.

***

When they are eleven he hands her a necklace and identifies it as her mother's, though she has not told him it is her mother's, and has not consciously thought of it as such.

"How did you know it was my mother's?" she inquires, fastening it and placing a hand over the large, smooth stone.

"I just knew," he replies, and his words are honey-warm and complacent in her mind's eye. This is something he does not question, and why would he? She is, she admits to herself, envious of his abilities. She takes it as an opportunity to better herself; to strengthen her mental walls until he truly cannot glean from her what she does not wish him to have. Sometimes, even when she thinks she has succeeded, she finds she has failed, but she takes it as a personal challenge.

Once she has realized how adept he is, it occurs to her to look to their peers, and after careful examination of those around him, she realizes that they have all had such a moment: Spock knows that which he should not—even without physical contact he slides past walls which are not fully formed. There is a lesson there; it is an opportunity for growth, but she realizes that they—all the other children of their own clan and others— are resentful of Spock. He is half-Human, and logic would dictate that he would not be a skilled telepath—that he would not be able to function as a full-blooded Vulcan would.

And yet he does not just meld with other Vulcans with an ease that is enviable; she has seen him meld with animals, with other species of humanoids; with _machinery_. There is evidence that he is capable of psychometry as well—she would have to test it more thoroughly to know for sure, as it is possible that he truly is simply gleaning the thoughts of the individual in relation to the object.

He also excels academically. She simply watches with a faint smile lurking in the back of her mind as he catapults beyond the skills and aptitudes of his "peers" and even older students.

Even those instructors who resent him have no choice but to give him flawless marks, and she takes pleasure in his success.

***

Not all of their classmates resent him. T'Ren is a promiscuous twelve; fascinated by reproductive processes, especially interspecial reproductive processes. She makes no secret of this, carrying the datafiles openly, and as Spock is the only hybrid at the Academy it is no secret that her interests lay with him.

She touches Spock far too often, and the green flush that curls at the nape of his neck informs T'Pring all she needs to know, even if the bond did not allow her insight into a challenge from this intruder on what is _hers_.

T'Pring will not have it, and so she sits next to T'Ren during a study break. T'Ren looks up as though apprehensive.

Good.

T'Pring says nothing, simply sits across from T'Ren complacently, but allows her mind to broadcast all manner of terrible things—some of which T'Pring has in her power to do, and others so wildly imaginative their purpose is to add ambiance rather than be truly threatening in a realistic sense. When Spock comes in she touches his arm and presses a kiss to his first and second fingers. He raises an eyebrow at her, and she raises both of hers back.

T'Ren gets up, murmurs a polite excuse, and all but flees.

"That was a little more than necessary, do not you think?" he inquires wryly.

"Just enough," she retorts, and realizes she will have to smooth the bite from her voice.

T'Ren never comes near him again, and the word goes around; Spock is T'Pring's.

**03.**  
When they are 14 hormones and pheromones begin to take over, and suddenly they all discover why, every so often, a woman challenges her bondmate, or her bondmate asks for all to be dissolved, or why, after the first seven years, the two elect to find someone better suited.

T'Pring thinks it would be logical to get to know him intimately; to know how best to relieve him of his arousal in a quick manner for when Pon Farr descends; to enjoy the act herself, rather than to just satisfy him; to endure it passively and without pleasure. It is logical to be prepared, after all, and she will admit to biologically-driven curiosity. She does not find him unattractive.

But Spock seems unwilling, and though a flush curls at the back of his neck when she, through their bond, attempts to convey this, he replies that his studies are more pressing upon him. There is always an excuse.

She tries to recall, precisely, definitively, when he started slipping from her, retreating from her entirely at times.

She cannot recall the date or the time or even the month or year, but at some point between eleven and thirteen he did, and now she cannot find him at all sometimes, and the space of her mind which moved and made room for him echoes with the absence of him.

Other times she can sit next to him and let the calm of his mind wash over hers and soothe her, and she can offer him the same serenity. Sometimes it is as though nothing has changed, and they are united against the world and he is raising an eyebrow at her because he can, and she cannot. At those times, when they are bent over a physics problem, solving it together for the pleasure of doing so, it is as though nothing has changed; at other times it is as though everything has, and that there is no going back from here.

T'Pok and T'Priela inform her that their bondmates and they have investigated stimulating arousal; T'Puo has, apparently, pursued more intimate physical relations with Sannek, who is not her bondmate. T'Ren has made the rounds, and is said to keep a chart which tracks stamina, force of orgasm, mutual satisfaction, and size of the organ. T'Pring has no idea whether to be appalled or amused, but it helps to strengthen her resolve to get what she wants.

And as logical as the request may be, when she approaches him and says, "I wish to pursue an intimate relationship for the purposes of establishing a baseline understanding of your physiology," he lifts his eyebrow and says;

"Fascinating." As though that is an appropriate response.

"Explain."   
 "I was not aware that you felt as such. Thank you for explaining. When would you like to arrange for this series of datagathering sessions to begin?"

She looks at him, and there is a sterile blue to his words, as shriveling disinterest as effective as a drought which turns all that was once lush to barren desert, and she no longer is so interested. The reciprocal nature of enjoyment in a feedback loop was imperative, she had found through inquiry. Undoubtedly his reluctance and scientific approach to mating would make the event less pleasurable (T'Ren has arduously assured them all that enthusiasm makes up for a multitude of failings, and T'Puo, who is far more reliable, has corroborated that finding), and therefore why engage in it if not for Pon Farr and the purpose of reproduction? She realizes that intimate, sexual relations between she and Spock will be relegated to the realm of necessity, not pleasure.

She declines to set a date, and they do not speak of it again.

***

She does not experiment with any of the others, however, though there are offers. There are minds which open in subtle invitations, an odd shock of fantasy when she brushes a hand reaching for a stylus or a datafile. Some of their peers are very imaginative, if not altogether based in reality (the Vulcan body, and indeed most likely no humanoid body, can bend in that way). They make heat pool at the base of her spine and in her abdomen

She is not willing to give up on she and Spock, not when she is still very fond of him, and when their childhoods were built upon this; designed to create a foundation for their future together.

She still takes pride in his academic excellence, and he gratifies her with a raised eyebrow when she wins recognition for her theories on morality and logic as relating to Surak's own teachings. The space in her mind, so frequently empty, warms with the red heat of sunset which she will always associate with him, and in those moments she supposes they will be fine.

She reasons that perhaps he is shy; perhaps being a hybrid has rendered him malformed in some way; perhaps he wishes to wait to know himself before he will know her; sexual closeness often triggers the bond to blow wide open, and he has become—no, he has always been—very private. His thoughts are his own, and what he shares he shares deliberately and with great forethought.

It is a very Human sentiment; to know oneself before knowing another. The entire purpose of having a bondmate at seven is to have someone with whom you are entirely invested in; to ensure that Pon Farr is successful and the blood burning is sated; that the coupling and marriage are stable, and thus the society is. To know oneself as defined by one's bondmate is the norm; she and Spock are becoming an exception, a strange, unexpected anomaly as their peers drift closer to their bonded, she and Spock drift further apart—and she is helpless to stop it.

And sometimes, when she steps back and looks at them in a purely analytical way, she does not want to stop it.

**04.**  
They are fifteen when the news of Tarsus IV ripples like a shockwave through the Federation. Colonization projects are abruptly put on hold, and T'Pring, with a certain morbid fascination, cannot stop watching the live stream holovids as survivors are catalogued, as Kodos' body is removed, as Winona Kirk grips the phaser that ended Kodos' life as though she wishes that she could end it a second time. The voice accompanying the 'vid informs her that Kirk's youngest son is a survivor.

Spock finds her in the concave she has claimed, and he stands behind her, watching as a camera swings past, and then jerks back to, two young males.

Both are humanoid, likely Terran; one brown-haired and one blond. The brown-haired one has his arms wrapped around the smaller blond in a protective gesture which fiercely ignores the entire external world, as though the boy in his arms is his world, metaphorically speaking. They are, improbably, sitting in the middle of the landing area for shuttlecraft, and completely oblivious to what is going on around them. Their facial similarities suggest that they are most likely brothers; the blond looks utterly vacant.

"My mother is sending out an invitation to those children who have survived. She believes that the application of logic might offer them a serenity they may not find otherwise."

"It is an admirable thought," Spock agrees, which is neither an endorsement nor dismissal. She turns to look at him, and after a moment he looks at her, the image of the boys reflected in eyes which should be easy to read but never are.

"It was not morally permissable," she says, testing a boundary she thinks she has found. T'Pol is this ruthlessly logical; morality is secondary to the good of the many. Sometimes Spock reminds her of T'Pol.

"There is a logic to it, however."

"There is—"

"The good of the many outweigh the needs of the few, or the one," he says seriously, and there is a faint grey in his voice with a strongly throbbing blue line: he means what he says.

"That is appalling," she informs him. "That makes you no better than those children who once mocked you for your heritage."

"I do not condone—"

"Spock," she interrupts, and she is striving to maintain her calm but she is angry, and she has not been angry in so long it tastes foreign. "Your father is going to Earth. Could you not go with him?"

"I have no desire to visit the planet," he replies, moving past her and up the stairs. "I will stay with my mother."

She did not mean to say it—does not mean it to be taken in a negative way. He is simply ignoring one facet of his biology, and as he changes and shifts into someone she does not know, she wishes that he would find something to trigger a regression of sorts. He performs admirably, always.

But he is no longer _hers_.

She does not think he is even his mother's, or his own. He belongs to his conflicts and struggles. She does not know how to remind him that, before Surak, Vulcan belonged to its conflicts and struggles and nearly destroyed itself.

**05.**  
He blows up a lab.

They are 16, and he blows up an entire _wing_ of labs. Professor Sacchek emerges singed and smoking, but Spock is in the dining hall and no one can directly point the finger at him.

That does not mean that she does not know of his guilt, cannot feel the vicious warm curl of satisfaction tinged with deep greens and reds, a feeling so strong that he cannot seem to keep it from transmitting through their bond.

She does not ask him, and he does not offer the information, does not let her into his confidence as he once would. But then, perhaps the fault is with her; she would have sat beside him and forced the tale out of him, assured him that she was on his side because she could not countenance being anywhere else.

They are growing apart, and there seems to be little she can do to stop it.

He is driven; he will someday be the best of them all, but she finds herself wondering… if she wants to be the wife of the best. If she is willing to settle for duty, for honor and a politically intelligent alliance void of a present husband. This, she knows is the true crux of the matter: even when he is present, he is not _there_, his mind pulled away into the stars to where she has neither desire nor inclination to follow.

He rarely socializes with any of them; he recognizes the resentment and fear in the rest of their peers; the distrust of the multitudes, and rather than thrust himself against their bigotry he instead outdoes them all, and then goes back to his home. He is very close with his mother—everyone knows that to insult Amanda Grayson is to inspire the wrath of Spock, and no one wants that. He is not a child, and will not attack them physically (though apparently he might blow up their offices with them inside), but as Vulcans discovered so long ago physical violence is not the only way to exact vengeance.

There was a young human telepath her mother dealt with who had looked at T'Pring solemnly and said, "I can kill you with my brain."

It was nonsense, of course: the child's abilities were like a whisper in a room full of people shouting, but she has of late looked at Spock and thought: He could kill us with his brain.

And yet still there are small moments, as they both sit in the library as she looks through biology files and medicinal journals and he, more and more frequently, reads on the philosophies of Surak instead of the planetary and astrological informational texts, where he is flickers into being as her old Spock.

"Do you wish to be the next Surak?" she inquires, partially facetious and partially genuinely curious.

"Without Surak's teachings Vulcans would be as warlike as we suppose Romulans to be. The predisposition to feel emotions with violence and within an instant is inherent in all Vulcans, and thus… it is necessary to meditate and practice strong self-control."

"Yes," she agrees, placing down her file and looking at him.

"I am half-Human," he says. "My burden is greater; I will attempt to complete the Kolinahr."

"The Kolinahr."

"Yes."

She does not say that she thinks he is attempting to prove for the last time his worth in Vulcan society; to become one or the other when biologically he is neither Human nor Vulcan.

But as she has not ever experienced such a crisis of identity, she does not say as much; she has always ever been entirely Vulcan. Her perspective is one of privilege and she is aware of it and how negative his response would be and how utterly unappreciated the comment would be. She does know that he has struggled with the conflict for all the time she has known him; if this will settle him she cannot say anything against it.

"I am sure you will excel if you have truly decided upon this course," she says. He is already surpassing many of their peers in his control over his emotions.

But Spock does not settle for excellent when he could have within tenths of percentages of perfection.

She watches him go after what he wants with a determination that borders on obsessiveness, and 16 fades into 17, which becomes 18 without her noticing the appreciable passage of time.

She turns to her own studies, and yet, by the time she is twenty, she finds that she is tired of defending Spock. She loves him dearly—she would house his katra and grieve him were he lost, but she is finding herself having difficulty being so defined by Spock.

**06.**  
She is 18 when she meets Stonn.

He is not of their clan, and he is not aesthetically appealing; his ears stick out from his head, which is flat on the top, and his nose droops slightly, but his mind is vibrant purples and the green of the plants which grow in the oasis gardens. His mind is open, and he is not persistent, and there are no fantasies thrust at her, and a flush curls at the nape of his neck as he catches and holds her gaze.

The first time they kiss it is an almost accidental brush of fingers, his sliding against hers. She feels heavy and warm, her breathing evening and slowing and the space at the base of her mind fills with the vibrant colors of Stonn's mind. It is not the mind she is used to, and it is no replacement for Spock—even without the bond, Spock's mind will always be more vibrantly enigmatic—but it is open and without any pretext other than attraction and respect.

As the flirtation stretches into months, she tells her mother of it.

Her mother smoothes her hand over T'Pring's hair and says, "It is logical to experiment with others. If becoming S'chn T'gai Spock's mate is distasteful, then you have the right to challenge it. Why not discover now, while you are young, whether you would like to, rather than be surprised when the time comes."

T'Pring looks at her, and Mother presses a kiss to her fingertips fondly. "It is remarkable to me that it has taken you so long to come to this point where another has caught your attention."

"I am loyal." She feels defensive; protective of him. The image all of Vulcan seems to have of him is so at odds with the reality she knows, even if he is a solitary, driven man, Spock is still exceptional and worthy of respect and not their fear and bigotry.

"Your affection for him may be strong, but consider, T'Pring: is this affection romantic and sexual in nature, or affectionately platonic and familial?"

It is, of course, the problem exactly. 11 years of being bonded is more than half of her life thus far. She does not know how to be without him in the back of her mind, and now that she is examining it, perhaps it is cowardice. Perhaps she clings to a boy she knew, who used to laugh until she taught him not to, who told her she spoke too much and who went out with his pet into the wilderness despite warnings against it, who melded with technology in order to fix her computers for her. She does not know this man, who is quietly self-contained, whose only confidant is his mother; who has a chip on his shoulder wider than the planet.

Her loyalty is to their past, but she feels no… future with him.

She seeks Stonn out, pushes him back into his apartment and kisses him. It is clumsy, and clinical, but exhilarating somehow. She feels…

She feels as though she is not doomed and heavy with responsibility, with only part of her life stretching before her with any appeal. No longer are her studies the things which bring her joy and satisfaction. Stonn expects her to be responsible for nothing, and she has no cause to be. He is not bound to her, nor she to him—their coming together is not one chosen by their parents or clan politics, but one of choice. She did not realize how liberating that would be.

She does not think of Spock at all for an entire weekend; it is as though the bond has gone dead, though of course it has not. It has simply lapsed from disinterest and disuse, and for once she fails to be conscious of it.

They are both letting go— it has simply taken her longer to realize that they have outgrown each other, or grown apart, despite her best efforts—and perhaps despite his, as it is entirely possible that, though she finds it lacking, this was his best effort..

Perhaps she needed to be shown the way; perhaps she is the proverbial horse which can be led to water but not forced to drink. She has always come to conclusions and revelations in her own time; this matter seems no different.

She thinks that she can have both Stonn and Spock; keep the political balance of the clan satisfied while having a life and a partnership which will please her.

Stonn may keep his bondmate, she may keep hers, and they will meet in the middle, and be satisfied.

Perfect logic.

**07.**  
She assumes that he will apply to the Vulcan Science Academy—where else can he learn and master the Kolinahr?

She has no doubt that they will accept him; his transcript is flawless, he tests perfectly—to deny him would be to admit a bias.

And so, when she receives a request that she come to see him at his home, she assumes it is to tell her in person the good news.

"What?" she says. She cannot…have heard correctly.

"I am leaving for Starfleet," Spock repeats.

She looks at him, clamping down hard on the part of her which attempts to be glad of what this means. "But— Spock. Surely the Science Academy accepted your application."

"They have. I declined."

"You declined. No Vulcan declines."

"As I am half-Human that statement continues to be true."

She looks at him, suddenly impatient. "It is illogical to continue to be so sensitive to the comments of others regarding your birth, Spock. What you have done is indeed a feat, giving your genetic make-up."

"It is not logical to continuously disdain a member of the community. Where is the impetus to excel without proper motivation?"

"Some consider the motivation of adversity to be adequate."

"Those who so do have only their intelligence called into question."

"You have decided entirely." It is not logical to continue arguing if he has decided completely, and yet she wants to meld with him to _make_ him see how foolish he is being; how stubborn; how much like them he is.

"I have."

"I will return….when it is time." He is, naturally, referring to the plak tow and Pon Farr in the circuitous manner which they all refer to it; embarrassed by these last vestiges of their primal heritage. They couch it in ceremony, pretend to honor it as a part of them, and yet they all resent it for the interruption it possesses; for the slap in the face to their culture it is—for the inherent contradiction it represents.

Even Surak did not find a complete solution for dealing with it—logically it serves a biological function, and yet logic cannot control it.

"Spock," she sighs. She reaches and takes his hand, pressing her fingers to his affectionately, as she would a sibling, a dear cousin or friend.

"I trust," he says with a wry look to his eyes that means he knows of Stonn, "that you will not suffer my absence."

It is a sour note to leave on, but any protestations would be lies and so she lets him withdraw his hand from hers and turn back to his home to where his mother is undoubtedly waiting to help him pack; to leave.

A week later, Spock is gone, and Vulcan seems the quieter for it.

She thought that, as they had let the bond lay by the wayside, that she would not feel his absence so acutely, but she is aware of it in every movement.

There is never a wave of condescension or anger or pride or vindication coming from an external source. A week after he has been gone she finds herself watching a sunset with no discernible pleasure, and it feels as though she must rediscover herself.

The bond tells her he is still alive, but she grieves in any event—she is unable to help it.

Stonn watches her with quiet concerned gray-blues in his mind, and she slides her fingers along his, and draws him to bed. She wants to know him just as herself.

**08.**  
He returns for his mother's birthday some six years later. It is a landmark, and thus the entire clan is there; Amanda Grayson is Sarek's wife, and the clan, at least, will not allow her to be exiled.

For six years T'Pring has been waiting for her experimentation with Stonn to wan—perhaps not waiting for, but there was an expectation that she would logically drift from him, and look to new partners. They live now as husband and wife, and she finds herself more and more wishing to meet the children they would make; wishing to know what it would be like if they were bonded. It is unnerving. She had expected the dalliance to be just that: a sexual dalliance. Instead he is the one who keeps her frustrations and stories of her daily life, and she his. He is the hand she reaches for when she is on uncertain ground, and…and it is unnerving.

More unnerving is that she does not know that Spock is on Vulcan until the moment she turns and catches him in profile, leaning down to listen to what Amanda Grayson is saying, his hand on her back. He seems…more Human.

She cannot help but broadcast the surprise through their bond; a flick of an eyebrow tells her that he is reading her as clearly as ever, and he makes his way through the crowds. She thinks he is both taller and leaner than he used to be, but his shoulders do not hunch, and his chin is not lifted defensively anymore. He has…settled, she thinks, to some degree.

Spock lifts his eyebrow at her, takes her hand in greeting. "T'Pring."

"Spock."

"How are you?"

"I am well. How are you enjoying Starfleet?"

"It is most challenging." He says it genuinely, and she is glad for him.

"And what do you do?"

"I teach."

He may be expanding upon that, but she is distracted by the realization that he has a bruise on his neck—no. Not a bruise in the sense that a "bruise" is characterized by violence, but a bruise inflicted by an amorous lover's mouth. She still cannot lift a single eyebrow, but both will suffice, even involuntarily. She had thought him to be asexual, but perhaps that was not it.

He is her bondmate, but she has chosen another, and yet still she experiences a moment of illogical jealousy as she once felt against T'Ren when they were young. He lifts a single eyebrow back at her in challenge to give voice to the questions ("Why this person?" "Do you wish to dissolve the bond?" "What are we, precisely?" "Are you as tired of this as I?") but she does not ask, and he does not offer any explanations. She does not know this Spock. This Spock walks with purpose; turns away from high council members to answer his comm; is unembarrassed by the physical evidence of a sexual encounter; says the correct words in the wrong tone of voice—"live long and prosper" has never sounded more like an insult than it does when it passes through his lips.

She loses track of him, though most certainly he is being attentive to his mother, and will be found at her side. T'Pring steps outside to watch the sunset to see if his proximity will render it beautiful and dear to her again.

"Jim," Spock is saying into his comm, watching the sunset at a remove from the rest of the gathering. There is something warm in his voice, fond and golden and blue even as his voice sounds formal. "I do not understand why— yes. The point is not to—" he breaks off, and she sees the smile in the way his shoulders have slid back, in the way his forehead smoothes, in the way that his left foot bears more of his weight. "You are correct. I never took the _Kobayashi Maru_. I have, however designed it." There is another pause. "Assisting you in cheating would be illogical." Pause, and a quick eyebrow arch, a flush of heat, visceral and unexpected as a punch. "Yes, even given that dataset."

"Something of interest?" Stonn inquires, fingers sliding down hers in a way that makes her turn to him, press against his side and indulge in the comfort of his presence, in the easy access of his mind which is always welcoming and will never shut her out.

"I will be home in two days," Spock continues. "Attempt not to give any of the admiralty heart failure in my absence—nor Doctor McCoy," Spock tells "Jim", his voice strangely indulgent, as though if he found that the man had given the admiralty or the doctor heart failure that he would be more amused than appalled.

It is…fascinating.

"No," she says to Stonn, turning to give Spock his space. "Nothing."

She has at least seven years more before the plak tow sets in; before she has to make a decision regarding the rest of her life. She can have Stonn for now, and Spock can have his Jim.

Perhaps in so many years time he will no longer want her; perhaps he will embrace his human side even further than he already has, and will choose to endure the Pon Farr with his human mate.

It is possible. Or he could have Jim, and she could have Stonn, and they could endure Pon Farr together.

She allows Stonn to secret them away, and she takes his hand and draws her fingers along it, watching his eyes slide shut and his lips part in pleasure. She could watch him unravel for hours; it is not logical, and sometimes she wishes she was still close enough to Spock to be able to say to him,

"I think that I might want to have Stonn— and our bond is not one predestined, and I have no baseline to judge this from except to know that it is not the norm, but I feel for him a passion that I cannot control and against my best judgment and in the face of all logic I— I think I am in love."

Because Spock was the keeper of her secrets when they were young, and the bond is still there, and will remain until he goes into Pon Farr and she has to decide between a man she hold great affection for but whom she does not know any longer but was promised to, and the man she adores as a mate who has no claim over her.

She says nothing; projects nothing, and in two days time he takes a ship back to Earth, and she does not hear from him again.

She is learning to tell Stonn these things, and he learning to tell her, but some things are best left unsaid until one is certain of their veracity; otherwise they may cause unintentional harm.

**09.**  
It has been six months since she has last seen Spock, and she is stretched on a bed in the dry heat, windows open and chimes rustling in the faint breeze. Her calves are over Stonn's shoulders, her heels digging into his back as his tongue presses against her clit, sucking and pressing and swirling until she is here, damp in the dry heat in a dreamy state of disconnect—an indulgence she is permitting herself.

The ground shakes, and Stonn lifts his head curiously. She turns her head, barely registering how absurd he looks with the lower half of his face glistening before he wipes it on a sheet, as a rolling tremor follows, so strong that the dry dusty dirt rises from the ground and flows through the air with prejudice. She grabs her robe, presses it over her nose and mouth and squints against it—there is an impossibly bright light on the horizon, but it is not the sun. Behind the tremor, now, follows a roaring din.

The collective conscious panics—it is blacks and browns and violent reds tinged with pale blues— and she has flashes of of a line of fire from the atmosphere burrowing into the ground, into Vulcan itself, and this cannot be natural. It cannot be—they are under attack. They must be.

She stares in horror, aware that her mask has slipped, aware that she is fast losing her grip on her emotions but her planet is going to be destroyed, and someone must have called Starfleet— they must be evacuating. Someone must be doing _something_, though if they are she cannot sense it, not even with the collective consciousness blown open and wholly accessible.

"T'Pring, what is—" Stonn begins, trailing off, his words a bewildered yellow as he freezes.

"I do not know," she replies, wrapping her hand around his and pulling him back inside, away from the window, where there is an illusion of safety under ceilings and surrounded by walls. She picks up her comm—if anyone knows what is going on, it will be T'Pau.

"What is it?" she demands when she gets through to T'Pau's residence.

_"Starfleet has been notified,"_ Storrik says calmly from the other end. _"They are sending the fleet to evacuate until measures can be taken—it is believed Vulcan is experiencing—"_

"Yes," she cuts in, impatient as lives are lost closest to ground zero, each feeling like a stab wound. "I can see what Vulcan is experiencing. Please keep me informed of any more discoveries as they are made."

The shaking grows, and it becomes difficult to keep her footing. She thinks, logically or not, that it must stop: that at some point the tremors (and that is such a mild word for what these violent wrenching, heaving convulsions are) must cease. Even as she is having that thought the house begins to crumble apart, long cracks that grow and splinter and then wrench apart suddenly, as if on a vindictive whim. The ground finally yeilds to the pressure and outside she can see it wrench apart, jagged edges sliding up and over each other as though at war.

She cannot decide if gripping so tightly to Stonn's hand is a help or a hazard, as he is so much bigger than she, and if he falls she will be dragged with him— yet she cannot bring herself to let go, even as she realizes that her planet is going to wrench itself apart and she is considering the relative merits of hand holding.

"Run!" she barks, and her voice sounds rough and high at the same time, and it is fear—it is pure fear that she is feeling, that is making her breath come too fast and her chest clench in terror. It becomes hot the further into the house they go, and she realizes, as they round a corner, that this is because the equipment has lit on fire, which is spreading outwards, consuming the house in a merrily garish frenzy.

The air is thick with smoke and sand and dust and her eyes are streaming constantly, and the cacophony of screams and panic and mindless terror from all other Vulcans is making it impossible for her to make a rational judgement call.

She looks at Stonn, and says, foolishly, "I wanted to meet our children."

He stares at her, and then swallows, because Vulcans do not lie, and so he cannot tell her that they will survive this. "I did too," he says instead, and kisses her, and it feels like goodbye.

They have run from the fire as far as they can, and the house is now coming down around them, wrenching in large pieces which plummet through the floor, sticking up like graves, which is morbidly appropriate.

She cannot breath, and she has lost Stonn—her hand is closed around nothing, and she cannot find him, and the loss halts her. She scans the crumbling wreckage of their home for him, but she can neither see nor sense him—he is gone to her, and perhaps it is fitting that in that moment the floor slips from underneath her and she loses her footing. The archway hurtles down and crushes her legs, and there will be no escape for her, she realizes. She is going to die here most assuredly—the only question is whether she is crushed to death or burned alive.

Another beam falls on her chest and she coughs, hacks and wrenches an arm so she can attempt to push it off, because survival instinct is stronger even than logic. She can taste blood every time she coughs, and she cannot breathe now at all.

Her vision is going dim, and then it bursts like a red sunset, warm and dear and familiar.

_Spock_ she realizes. Spock is on Vulcan.

_Be safe_ she wills at him, bond thrown as open as she can, but she does not know if she is… if he can receive it, over the sound of all of their dying screams.

Because they are all dying, and they all know it.

_Do not grieve,_ she sends. _Live long and prosper_.

She feels cold, and thinks she will just close her eyes for a moment. Then she will send him another message: _Run_.

She does not.


End file.
